


the blackwood tapes

by blueskiddoo



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, M/M, Sort Of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-29
Updated: 2020-09-29
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:40:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24985453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueskiddoo/pseuds/blueskiddoo
Summary: Jon picks up the folder but doesn’t open it, frowning down at the stiff manilla paper. “Lived,” he says, looking up. “You said helivedwith his sick mother. Where does he live now?”“Nowhere, as far as the police know,” Tim says. He nods at the folder. “Police report’s inside. Martin Blackwood went missing in January of 2015. Little over a year ago now. No one’s seen him since.”“Oh.”*martin blackwood is one of gertrude robinson's archival assistants in 2013. in 2016, jonathan sims is just getting started as the head archivist at the magnus institute. when jon finds a box of tapes recorded in martin's voice, he realizes that there's more to them than ordinary statements. in 2016, jon can hear martin's recordings. in 2013, martin can hear jon's too.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 324
Kudos: 536





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not saying this is a the lake house (2006) au but also it kinda is just a little bit

He doesn’t think much about the Blackwood tapes when he first finds them.

They’re just one more box among the absolute nightmare that Gertrude left behind for him when she went off and died, leaving the Head Archivist’s office like an attic full of detritus to be picked over by the grandchildren. Jon almost cried when he first opened the door, a moth fluttering out with a sad puff of dust. Gertrude’s legacy was teetering stacks of cardboard boxes and dented filing cabinets filled with loose leaf paper and cassette tapes labeled with meaningless numbers. It must have made some sort of sense to someone once, but not anymore. Now Gertrude is dead and it’s all his. 

Some people have all the luck.

At least he can walk in it now, after an entire day spent hauling boxes out of the office and into the archives, where he, Tim, and Sasha blew the dust off and organized them into something vaguely sensical. They’ll still have to go through each and every one of them to try to suss out some kind of organizational system, but now they sit in tidy rows on the metal shelving lining the Head Archivist’s office, each bearing an increasingly creative name in Tim’s handwriting. Jon’s already worked through the _Cobweb Disaster_ and the _A Bit Nasty But Not Too Bad_ boxes, which more than lived up to their names. 

Now he stops, one hand reaching for the box that stares back at him. It’s late in the day, the tipping point where he has to decide if he’s going to leave on time or stay just a bit longer in the name of putting a dent in the mess. Jon was only going to take a glance at the box for tomorrow, but the name catches his eye. 

_The Blackwood Tapes._ The corners of his mouth twist. Tim must have been feeling particularly dramatic when he found this one, but if it’s at all related to its contents, he can’t complain. Whoever Blackwood is, he hopes that he was tidier than Gertrude Robinson. 

Jon pulls it off the shelf and sets it on the desk, working off the cardboard lid. Black cassette tapes sit in neat rows, their labels edged with dust where Tim or Sasha must have wiped them clean to see what’s written underneath. It’s a sea of the same neat handwriting in black ink. Some have long strings of numbers similar to the other tapes they’ve found. Others only have dates. All have initials written in the far right corner, small and smudged like they’re trying not to be noticed--MKB. 

“Hm,” Jon hums to himself, tapping one finger against the initials. Blackwood’s, he has to presume. An archivist before Gertrude? Certainly not--Gertrude was no spring chicken and the tapes are old but not _ancient_. One of her archival assistants? Curious. Jon doesn’t know much about them, except for the fact that there were none of them left for him to inherit. He was curious as to why until he saw her office. He’d have gone searching for greener pastures too. 

Well. One statement before the end of the day won’t hurt. 

He intends to record the statements that haven’t been already, but considering that none of the written statements are paired with their recorded counterparts, that means he has to go through all of them before he even knows which have already been done. No point digitizing the lot of them either, considering, despite Sasha’s best efforts, every attempt ends in meaningless static. Cassette tapes, it is. 

The ancient tape player accepts the first tape with an eager click-whirl-click. 

_“Case 4590464 -- um, Linda Softhollow. Who--I mean, regarding the haunting of a farmhouse belonging to her father, Richard Softhollow. Statement given February 24th, 1986. Recorded by Martin Blackwood on January 4th, 2013. Okay, here we go then--_

_My father and I have never seen eye to eye, but he didn’t deserve what he got…”_

The statement itself is the same drivel as the rest of them--spooky farmhouse, monster in the darkness, dead father. It’s obvious enough that Linda Softhollow is projecting her own guilt for her tumultuous relationship with her father onto shadows. If her geriatric father died trying to single-handedly run a farm, then she might have to feel bad about it. Nothing that could have been done about _vicious shadow monsters_ though. Jon scoffs and moves to rewind the tape. 

_”Let’s see. Final comments…”_

Jon hesitates, his finger over the button. He’s gotten into the habit of stopping the tapes after the statement is concluded--Gertrude often leaves notes like this at the end of her recordings, but the few he listened to were largely pointless and just as nonsensical as her filing system. But something about Martin Blackwood’s voice makes him pause. He wasn’t nearly as straightforward as Gertrude, brutally efficient in a way her other work habits decidedly were not. He was soft-spoken and a little bumbling, tripping over words until his voice finally fell into a gentle storytelling cadence. He was…

He was unexpected enough that Jon lets the final comments play, his finger still hovering over the pause button.

 _“...According to the police report, Richard Softhollow died of a broken neck after a fall from the upper level of his barn. I went out there, looked at the barn. It is a long fall, wouldn’t be hard to break your neck, that’s for certain.”_ He laughs a little nervously. _“Gertrude seems to think it’s all mundane. I suppose she’s probably right. She’s the boss.”_ Another soft huff of laughter. 

Jon finds himself nodding. Yes, obviously. It’s good to know that Gertrude maintained at least some spark of sense, even in her old age. 

_“...but I don’t know,”_ Blackwood continues. _“Linda Softhollow_ hated _her father. I mean, just the way she_ talks _about him. So why would she go to the trouble of coming to the Institute and giving a statement if she didn’t truly believe something happened? I know, I know--mental illness, or maybe she just wanted a laugh--but...I don’t know. The way she described the darkness...it felt real.”_ He pauses for a long moment, almost long enough that Jon thinks the tape has run out. Then Blackwood exhales, his breath a puff of static in the speakers. _“But really I guess I can’t figure out why Richard Softhollow was on the upper level of his barn at that time of night. Why would he be up there? Unless...he was chased.”_

The tape clicks off. Jon stares at it, his finger still hovering uselessly over the stop button. 

He blinks, coming back to himself with a little shake. A waste of time, just like Gertrude’s final comments. He should have known. The only difference is that Blackwood provides unnecessary personal commentary in addition. How very professional. 

Jon clears his throat and picks up the digital voice recorder waiting next to the tape player. Statements may refuse to record digitally, but his personal notes don’t. Thank God. He’s always found focus in being able to say things aloud, or organize his tangled thoughts into words. That, and there needs to be some recorded evidence that he tried his best after he’s found tragically killed under an avalanche of disorganized cassette tapes. 

He clicks record. “March 3rd, 2016. Began work on box number three, labeled the Blackwood Tapes. Note: remind Tim _again_ that boxes should be organized by number, _not_ whimsical titles of his choosing. Tapes appear to be recorded by one Martin Blackwood, suspected to be an archival assistant of the late Gertrude Robinson, circa 2013. Further investigation may be necessary--if Mr. Blackwood can be found, he might be able to provide further insight on the…” He looks around the office. “...puzzle of Gertrude’s organizational system. In the meantime, the tapes, while labeled, have been filed separately from their original statements. Each will have to be gone through to ensure the quality of the recording, as well as matched up with the original statement file. Meaning…” 

Jon’s mouth turns down at the corners and his voice goes flat. “I’m afraid I am going to be getting very familiar with Mr. Blackwood.”

*

“We need a third archival assistant,” Tim announces, balancing a pen on one finger. It spins on his fingertip, wobbling dangerously. The archive is littered with the latest round of boxes, unearthed from a storage closet they hadn’t noticed before. Jon usually isn’t one much for breaks, but they need a minute just to clear the dust from their lungs. “Preferably one who’s very strong and loves to lift big, dusty boxes.”

Jon looks up over his glasses. “And who would you suggest?” He says dryly. 

The pen tips over and Tim snatches it out of the air as it falls. He hums thoughtfully, tapping the pen against his nose. “Daniela from Research,” he says. “She likes tedious, boring things. I bet you anything she has a thing for you too.”

Jon scowls, ignoring the way his ears warm up. “Try again.”

“Marcus from Artefact Storage,” Sasha chimes in. “I saw him lift this big sea chest over his head once. Covered in barnacles and everything. Very impressive.”

‘Why was he lifting a sea chest?” Jon says incredulously. Nevermind the fact was there was a sea chest lying around in the first place--anything is possible in Artefacts Storage. 

“Henry from Library,” Tim adds. “Or Sarah. You know, the secretary.”

Sasha scoffs. “Now you’re just listing people you want to ogle.” 

“How do you think you got the job?” Tim laughs and ducks sideways as Sasha lobs a balled up wad of paper in his direction. He nearly tips off the chair. 

“You can ogle on your own time,” Jon says with a scoff. “Or at least after we’ve gotten this place into a semi-decent state.” Still, something scratches at the back of his mind. He pulls the closest box toward him and begins to pick at the file folders inside without really looking at the labels. “Are either of you familiar with a Martin Blackwood?” He enunciates _Blackwood_ a little sharper than necessary. 

Tim hums thoughtfully. “I don’t think so,” he says. “Why? Is he particularly beefy?”

“Martin...Oh, that sounds familiar.” Sasha snaps her fingers. “I think I met him at an office party once.” She turns to Tim. “I wouldn’t use the word beefy, I don’t think. But it’s been a few years, he could have been working out in the meantime.” 

“I don’t care if he’s--” Jon sighs and rubs at the place his glasses rests on his nose. “There’s a box of statements that he recorded in my office. See what you can find out about him. If he can be found, he might be convinced to tell us the method to Gertrude Robinson’s madness.” 

“On it!” Tim squawks, moving so fast that he almost tips out of his chair all over again. He rolls with the movement and jumps to his feet. “Better go ask HR about employment records. No time to lose.”

“Tim!” Sasha calls after him. “This does not get you out of box duty!”

*

_“...unfortunately Steven Braddock died three months ago, in a work-related incidence on a construction site. From what I was able to find in my research, he fell out of a tenth story window. I have to agree that this one does seem rather...Vast-flavored.”_ Blackwood sighs softly. _“I hope he found a little bit of happiness, you know? In the months before. It’s silly, I know. But...still. I hope that he did.” Click._

Jon leans back in his chair and holds his digital recorder up to his mouth. “Mr. Blackwood continues to prove to be needlessly sentimental and directionless. His audio recordings are theatrical at best, in the way of a community theater production of Hamlet might be. Heartfelt, to be sure, but ultimately amateur,” he drawls. His free hand drums against his desk softly, so as not to let the sound carry to the digital recorder. “Tim is pursuing information on the current whereabouts of Mr. Blackwood, but with each progressive tape, I lose confidence that anything of use will come from finding him.”

He pauses, resting the recorder against his chin. This is the fifth of the Blackwood Tapes, and he has growing confidence that they’ll all conform to a similar pattern. A stuttering introduction, like there’s a format he’s meant to adhere to but he keeps forgetting the details, followed by the statement itself, before ending with Blackwood’s final comments. He’s started playing the tapes while he does paperwork in order to work through them more efficiently. What he doesn’t say is that the statement part is actually a bit nice to listen to, at least in a way that Gertrude’s are decidedly not. If he stopped the tapes there, he could probably listen to them in relative peace. But the problem is--

Well, the problem is that he’s _Jon_ , really. The problem is that Blackwood’s final comments _bother_ him and some terrible, pointless part of him likes to be bothered. So he lets the tapes play until they click off, and his voice recorder hears all about it. 

“In addition to pointless sympathies, Mr. Blackwood continues to waste time entertaining the validity of the events described in these statements, including, but not limited to, a man walking on thin air as if it were glass.” He snorts softly. “Note: ask Sasha to look into the numbers on how many past statements still need to be committed to audio. Time permitting, we may have to re-record the Blackwood tapes.” Jon sighs. “As if we don’t have enough to do.”

There’s a gentle knock at his office door and Jon looks up, letting his hand and the voice recorder drop back down. “Come in.”

Tim pokes his head through the door and immediately Jon’s nerves prickle. There are many different shades of Timothy Stoker--office casual Tim and professional Tim and the Tim that keeps trying to wheedle Jon into getting drinks with him and Sasha after work on Fridays. This is serious Tim, a shade quieter than the professional Tim that usually comes out when he’s talking about whatever follow-up work he’s done. He’s holding a file folder in one hand. 

“Did that research you wanted, boss,” he says, holding up the folder. “Afraid it might not be what you were looking for though.” 

Jon sets the recorder on the desk. “What is it?”

“This is what I could find on Martin Blackwood.” Tim sets into the offer to set the folder down on Jon’s desk. “Not too much to find. Lived with his sick mum, got a job working up in Library a few years back before transferring down to the Archives under Gertrude. Not sure how--his CV reads a bit more like creative writing if you really look at it, but something must have worked because he stuck around. Not many details available about his time down here though. Surprising to no one, Gertrude didn’t really keep up with performance reviews.”

Jon picks up the folder but doesn’t open it, frowning down at the stiff manilla paper. “Lived,” he says, looking up. “You said he _lived_ with his sick mother. Where does he live now?”

“Nowhere, as far as the police know,” Tim says. He nods at the folder. “Police report’s inside. Martin Blackwood went missing in January of 2015. Little over a year ago now. No one’s seen him since.” 

“Oh.” 

The Blackwood Tapes box seems to take up more of his desk now, a silent constant on the periphery of his vision, filled with tapes carrying the voice of a dead man. He must be. Dead, that is. People don’t go missing for that long and come back from it, especially not those with sick mothers. And only a few months before Gertrude would meet her end. He should make a note of that, but suddenly his mouth feels rather dry.

“Right, Thank you, Tim,” Jon says, collecting himself. He’s been listening to Gertrude’s tapes, hasn’t he? He should be used to hearing ghosts. 

“No problem.” Tim shoots him a half-hearted salute before taking his leave, leaving the tragedy of Martin Blackwood for Jon to deal with. Fair enough. Jon did ask for it.

Jon belatedly remembers to hit stop on the voice recorder. He stares down at the file, his hand spread over the top of it. Shockingly thin, to hold a man’s life in it. Granted, a relatively short life. Blackwood sounds fairly young in the tapes, and he disappeared, what--a year? Year and a half after the first tapes were recorded? 

He sets the file aside and pulls a tape out of the box instead. Martin Blackwood isn’t going to be found, there’s no confusion about that now, but there’s still work to be done. 

The sixth tape doesn’t have a case number written on the label, only a _???_ followed by the same spikey initials in the corner, MKB. He wonders idly what the K stands for as the tape whirls to life.

 _“Case number...well, there isn’t one. Yet. Maybe.”_ Blackwood exhales gustily. _“Statement recorded March 1st, 2013, directly from subject. Statement of Martin Blackwood, regarding the mysterious appearance of cassette tapes around the archives.”_

Jon’s nerves prickle again and his finger rests against the stop button, but doesn’t press down. Blackwood’s voice fills the room, soft but pervasive. It holds him there as sure as any grip. 

_”Two months ago, Gertrude asked me to help record statements. The less important ones, I think--the less interesting ones, or the ones she thinks are fake. Things she thinks I can’t mess up, basically.”_ A self-deprecating laugh. _“Fair enough. I enjoy doing them. Even the real nasty ones aren’t so bad if you try to just...lose yourself in the story of it. Forget that they’re real people. I think Gertrude does that a lot. Forgets._

_“But something’s changed. The last few weeks I’ve been finding tapes around the archives. In the strangest places too--on top of filing cabinets and behind potted plants. No label, no anything. So I listen to them. That’s what we _do_ , isn’t it? Listen and record and...well, that’s when things got strange. _

_“Someone is listening to these tapes. To the statements I’ve recorded. I don’t know who he is, but the way he talks…”_ Blackwood pauses. _“It doesn't make any sense. He makes it sound like_ he’s _the one working in the archives, but I’ve never heard his voice before. And I would remember. He--”_ A soft huff, not quite a laugh. _“He makes it_ very _clear what he thinks about me._

Jon’s heart skips a beat and he almost presses the stop button. Almost. 

_“He makes it sound like Gertrude is--is _dead_. He makes it sound like…”_ Blackwood hesitates. _“I found another one yesterday, under my desk. There’s someone else in this one, at the end. Someone named Tim._

_“He said I went missing. He said I went missing almost a year from now.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [jon voice] if I'm not a hypocrite while complaining about martin I'll die  
> [me voice] if I'm not writing communication-based jonmartin aus I will also die
> 
> can't believe I'm writing a fic that necessitates keeping a timeline but here we go! shout out to my nerd friends who understand the tma timeline far better than I ever will for helping figure out some logistics. 
> 
> you can also find me on tumblr at [divineatrophy](https://divineatrophy.tumblr.com/) and on twitter at [blueskiddoodle!](https://twitter.com/blueskiddoodle)


	2. Chapter 2

_“...Melissa Bell refused our requests for a follow-up interview. I can’t say I blame her. No sign of the silhouette for the last ten years. I see why Gertrude gave me this one. Not very interesting, is it? Hard to verify anything about a woman being haunted by the silhouette of her dead dog besides a hard knock to the head. Even I’m having trouble believing it, and I’m—”_ A soft huff of laughter. _“Sentimental, was it?”_

A pause, endless and filled by the soft whirring of the tape. Jon can hear Sasha and Tim talking outside, their voices muffled by the closed door. His heart beats steadily but too loud, unaware of the tense line of his shoulders.

_“...Are you still listening?”_ Blackwood’s voice is tentative, like he feels as foolish as Jon does, staring at a tape recorder like it might reach out and bite him. _“I haven’t found any tapes recently. Not sure if that’s your fault or mine. Maybe there’s ten of them hidden in my desk drawer. I’ve been meaning to clean that out. Bet the next one will be scolding me for that if it’s true.”_ There’s a smile in his voice.

Another pause, shorter this time.

_“Alright, scared you off a bit now that you know I can hear you. Imagine how I feel. Not every day you get told you’re going to disappear, is it? Or have already disappeared. I would_ love _to say that’s the strangest thing that’s happened to me in this job but—ha. You work at the Institute, don’t you? You know.”_

Jon snorts softly. He does know. Strange statements, statements that step too close to the real to sit comfortably, absolutely—but usually they don’t talk back.

_“I’d like to know your name,”_ Blackwood says, tentative all over again. _”Or a nickname, or just something to call you. I promise I won’t try to look for you if you don’t want me too. If you can even be found—Christ, if you’re even_ real _. Just...something I can think of you as. Unless you like being known as Grouchy Tape Man._

_“Erm. Yeah. Let me know.”_ Click.

Jon exhales gustily and pulls out the tape, the holes in the case staring at him like two beady eyes. He carefully replaces it in the box.

He leans back until his chair creaks and presses his fingertips against his eyes, his glasses pushed up awkwardly in a way that’s sure to smudge. He’s worked through a few more of the Blackwood tapes—all of them normal statements, without additional editorializing until now. His voice recorder sits on his desk, untouched except for where he’s worn the plastic glossy with his thumb, fidgeting restlessly but never daring to hit record. 

If this were a normal statement he’d lean into skepticism like a warm blanket, but it’s hard to reach for it now. How can he? Somehow Martin Blackwood circa 2013 is hearing his voice memos. Barring an elaborate prank, there isn’t a reasonable explanation readily available, even after some digging.

So he’s looked into Blackwood himself instead, though as Tim promised, there isn’t much to find. His personnel file sits on Jon’s desk, his picture paperclipped to the front of the manilla folder. He looks...friendly. Blackwood squints at the camera through oversized glasses, somewhere between fashionably shabby and just old, his mouth quirked in an uncertain little smile. His shoulders are curled in on himself slightly, before the bottom of the picture cuts him off at the chest, like he’s trying to make himself smaller, or just unobtrusive. He looks like someone you could bump into on the street and he would apologize. 

Jon gives himself a little shake. He’s prescribing too much to a simple picture, and he knows it’s only because the man is missing-presumed-dead. He should know better. In reality, he never would have hired Martin Blackwood to work in the archives, and frankly, he can’t believe that Gertrude did either. Maybe it was a clerical error. He allows himself to enjoy the little joke for a moment before his smile drops.

Maybe.

Jon grabs the voice recorder and holds it up to his mouth, hesitating. His thumb rests against the record button, but he hasn’t pushed it. This is mad. This is stupid. This is not going to work. 

But then—if he believed that, he wouldn’t be hesitating. 

He presses the button. “Tell me your story,” he says slowly, choosing the words carefully, like a child from a story bartering with a faerie, “and I’ll tell you mine.”

Jon presses the button again to end the recording and exhales, letting it drop back to the desk. He actually finds himself waiting there, his shoulders tense and his hand pressed flat against his desk, as if something is going to happen. 

“Right,” he says to himself. “One way to find out then.”

He’s avoided looking at the labels on the tapes, purposefully letting his eyes skip over the words to avoid settling on the ones without case numbers. Some have dates on them (the day and the month—not the year) but others are blank except for the initials in the corner and sometimes a symbol. The last had been a _???_. The one in his hand is a _!_.

A shiver crawls up his spine. What are the odds that the next tape is a non-statement? What would have happened if he’d listened to it before he’d made his own recording? It doesn’t matter, because he _didn’t_. He supposes that must be the point. 

He clicks the tape into place and hits play with more force than necessary.

_”That’s it?”_

Jon jumps, nearly cracking his knee against the underside of his desk. Usually Blackwood talks softly, like he’s trying not to disturb someone in the other room, and sort of...steps into what he’s saying rather than barreling straight to the point. Now he sounds—well, mostly he sounds annoyed. 

_“My—creepy magic stalker talks to me for the first time in months, and that’s it? Honestly.”_

“I’m not a _stalker,_ ” Jon argues reflexively. His ears grow warm. As if things weren’t bad enough, now he’s talking to the tape recorder while it’s running. He’s truly lost his mind now.

Blackwood huffs laugh and Jon has the sudden image of him shaking his head. _“Anyway,”_ he sighs. _”Fine. I’ll tell you...what do you want to know? Everything? It’s really not…”_ His voice wavers uncertainly, what confidence his annoyance lent him flagging. _“It’s really not exciting._

_“Um. Okay. I shouldn’t—I_ really _shouldn’t be saying this. I_ will _lose my job if Gertrude hears this, or if you tell her or Elias or anyone, so...please don’t. I’m trusting you, so maybe you might trust me too.”_

Jon smothers a twinge of guilt. Blackwood—wherever, whenever he is—is in the exact same position that Jon is. Worse even, considering from his position, Jon is the voyeur. He supposes he at least should have given him his name.

_“So—ah, what is there to say? Statement of Martin Blackwood regarding his lackluster personal history, blah blah, etcetera. Things were...I don’t know, normal? In the beginning, at least, though I suppose I won’t remember much of that. You see everything a little different when you’re a kid. It’s hard to tell what was true and what you just wish was true.”_ A little sigh almost inaudible. _“Mum’s been sick as long as I remember. But I swear it got worse, after Dad left. I was oh, eight? Maybe nine at the time. Too young to really understand, but not much of a choice, was there? Someone had to take care of her. I quit school at seventeen and just...figured it out. I always figured it out._

_“But it got harder. It’s not easy finding a job without a proper education, at least not if I wanted to live off anything but beans and canned peaches. Then the recession hit and it became impossible. I don’t—I don’t_ like _lying, it’s not_ fun _for me, but that’s what I started to do. I applied everywhere and anywhere, and whatever they were looking for, that’s what I became. I didn’t think about the Institute much when I applied—it mostly looked like the sort of place that would pay well, if I’m being honest. I...really wasn’t expecting to get a call back. Or an interview. Or the job.”_ His laugh as a distinctly self-deprecating slant. 

_“Let’s see...I worked up in the library for a while. I liked being around all the books—most of the spooky ones got sent down to Artefact Storage, so it was pretty calm. It was nice. Quiet. I would have stayed there happily, but—I don’t know if you’ve_ met _Gertrude Robinson, but she doesn’t really take no for an answer.”_ Is that an edge of fondness in his voice? Jon almost makes a sideways comment about Stockholm Syndrome setting in before he remembers that Blackwood can’t hear him. _“I really don’t know why she wanted me here in the archives—I don’t—I don’t think she even_ likes _me, but...here I am.”_ Jon can hear him shrug. _“That’s it, really. And now I’m finding tapes under my coaster and talking to them like a madman. I don’t know if you got anything from all that—but if you have any theories, I’d love to hear them. Or your name. Favorite color. Star sign. Anything?”_

Blackwood sighs. _“Sorry, this is just...it’s all a little freaky. Just trying to make it feel less like talking to myself._

_“Anyway. Martin Blackwood signing out—oh no, I didn’t like that. Not doing that again. Okay. Goodbye.”_ Click. 

Jon exhales and closes his eyes. It’s not much more than his file told him, but something about hearing it in Blackwood’s own voice makes it startlingly real. He considers it like he might a statement; parses out the possibilities from the information that’s likely not important. Absent father, sick mother? Formative, he’s sure, but unlikely to be involved in the mystery at hand. The lying is interesting—Tim had said as much about the CV, but hearing the way Blackwood described it scratched at the uncertain part of Jon’s brain that still felt very small sitting behind Gertrude’s old desk. Still, it’s more likely to play into the next point than be something that’s significant on its own.

Gertrude had wanted him to work for her. Had chosen him specifically. Why?

Jon hesitates, the voice recorder a dark presence in the corner of his eye. There’s no reason to jump to his end of the bargain now. Time, for all appearances, means little. Blackwood had said he hadn’t heard from Jon in months, when in reality he’s only been listening to the Blackwood Tapes for going on a week. Even if he records it now, there’s no way to know when it’ll mysteriously appear in Martin Blackwood’s life.

He _will_ feel like an ass though.

Jon sighs and clicks record, sparing one last furtive look at his office door, carefully closed. “My name is Jonathan Sims,” he says, careful to keep his voice low, in case Tim or Sasha passes by the door too closely. “Head Archivist at the Magnus Institute, London.” He hesitates again, his mouth open by the words caught behind his teeth. There are two versions of this story. More than that, actually, depending on who he’s talking to, though he doesn’t jump out of his way to tell his life story to begin with. He tries to gloss over the dead parents when he can, tries to soften the dreary, endless childhood that explains too much about him now. Tragedy either makes people avert their eyes or look too closely. He’d rather they do neither. 

And that’s to say nothing about the spiders.

He almost says it—he thinks that must be worth something. What? Is the man on the other side of a supernatural tape recorder going to scoff at the story of a little boy with a book about a spider? He’s heard Blackwood entertain statements stranger than his own.

Almost. _Almost._ But he can’t.

Instead he adjusts his grip on the voice recorder and says, “and my story isn’t very exciting either, I’m afraid.”

*

“Sasha,” he says.

Sasha stops in the middle of the hall, her head going up like a startled meerkat. “Yeah, Jon?” she says. “Something that matter?”

It’s late afternoon and they’re alone. Tim left early for an appointment and Jon is on his way out as well. It’s absurd how much it feels like he’s doing something wrong, considering how many hours he’s stayed late this week alone, but his head is killing him. The mystery of Martin Blackwood rolls like a tape behind his eyes, but it’s all tangled, and the more he tries to unravel the knots, the worse the feedback gets. He needs a long shower and a dark room. Maybe he’s coming down with something.

He fully intends to make a quiet exit, but Sasha’s name trips out of his mouth as he spots her headed to the breakroom, her fingers looped through the handles of a couple of dirty mugs.

“Erm,” he says eloquently, as caught unawares as she is. He clears his throat. “You knew Gertrude, didn’t you?”

“Ah. A bit.” Sasha fidgets, uncharacteristically awkward. 

“Do you know if she kept her own personal records? Anything on how she ran the place we might have missed?”

Sasha’s eyebrows twitch upwards and he sees understanding dawn on her face. Her shoulders relax. “Still looking into those Blackwood Tapes?” she says, almost teasing. “They must be something special.”

“Something like that,” Jon says dryly. His headache pounds against the backs of his eyes.

“I...yes, I think she probably did,” Sasha says hesitantly. The mugs click against one another as she adjusts her grip. “I don’t know where they’d have gone to. I didn’t really—I didn’t really know her that well. And the police were here, of course. But—” She bites off the word.

Jon frowns. Sasha isn’t usually so uncertain. “What is it?”

“I do think Elias took some of her things from her office. Probably just Institute business he didn’t want the police prying into, I’m sure.” She shrugs, but her expression is uncomfortable. “Try asking him?” 

Somewhere, in the back of Jon’s mind, behind the tortured pounding of what’s threateningly to become a migraine, an alarm bell rings. It’s hard to place it, hard to give it a name except for _no, not that, I don’t think so._ Elias Bouchard’s eyes are too pale, too sharp. They see too much. The same way Sasha comes dangerously close to doing as she watches him. If Sasha suspects that there’s more going on than he lets on, then Elias will know. 

And he can’t risk that. He doesn’t know why—because Elias will believe him or he won’t, he’s not sure which outcome is worse—but he knows that he can’t. Not yet. There’s still too much he doesn’t know.

“Right,” Jon says stiffly. “Thank you, Sasha.”

She lifts the mugs in a faux-cheer. “Happy to help.”

*

It takes him two days to decide that he’s going to break into Elias’ office.

In retrospect, he knows he decided while standing in the hallway across from Sasha, headache pulverizing his brain, but it took him another two days to accept it. Probably because breaking into your boss’s office is something only people who want to be fired and/or arrested do, and Jon has never considered himself either of those things. And yet—

And yet the Blackwood Tapes sit in a semi-permanent spot on the corner of his desk, the tidy rows of tapes like grinning teeth every time he catches a glimpse inside of it. He throws himself into organizing the rest of his office, losing himself in the dust and cobwebs. He leaves work with his sleeves pushed up to his elbows and his glasses smudged, more than a little sweaty from moving boxes around, but he can’t get Martin Blackwood’s voice out of his head, no matter how much he avoids listening to the next tape. 

With so many statements, even the ones he might believe— _especially_ the ones he might believe—it’s easy to push them aside, to pretend they’re not real people, and if they are, they didn’t matter. Didn’t Martin say something to that effect, in the first tape directed at him? In that tape he stopped being a voice and started to become something more, something that talks back. Martin is real. Or he was. 

_Was_. Past tense. That bothers him. 

When people can do nothing else, they bear witness. It’s why they watch someone jump from a bridge, or hold the hand of the dying, or open cases that have been cold so long that there’s no justice left to be served. You can’t take away the pain, so instead you carry it. 

He needs to know what happened to Martin Blackwood. 

He waits until Tim and Sasha have left for the night to put in another Blackwood tape. Another statement. He listens to it with his head pillowing on his arms, his glasses folded on the desk in front of him. Martin’s voice is soft and methodical, once he gets past the traditional stumbling in the beginning and sinks into the statement itself. Jon could almost fall asleep if he weren’t so aware of his own beating heart, louder the closer Martin gets to the end of the statement. When he finishes his final comments and drops into silence, Jon’s heart sinks with it. He can’t tell if he’s disappointed or relieved. 

Maybe he hasn’t found the tape yet. Maybe he’s decided to ignore this whole mess, like they both probably should. Maybe—

_“Goodnight, Jon,”_ Martin says softly, like it’s a secret, a soft smile coloring his voice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> martin looks me directly in the eye and says 'oh? you're tired of typing italics tags? _too bad_ '
> 
> thank you for all the comments and kudos, they mean a lot!! hold on there because we should start getting into some drama next chapter (; there's a lot of stuff coming up that I'm really excited about!!
> 
> you can also find me on tumblr at [divineatrophy](https://divineatrophy.tumblr.com/), twitter at [ blueskiddoodle](https://twitter.com/blueskiddoodle), or in a strange, prophetic dream.


	3. Chapter 3

He waits until they’re having an office party.

Not the Archives—it’s hard to have a party with three people, especially when one of those people is him. No, this one is put on by Artefact Storage, which is largely filled by people so bizarre that the whole Institute is at least mildly curious what that kind of party looks like.

“They’re not that bad,” Sasha says, waving her hand dismissively.

“You would say that,” Jon mutters.

“ _I_ came from Artefact Storage.”

Tim props his chin on his fist. “And didn’t you hate it there?”

“Well...yes,” Sasha concedes. She pauses. “But they do know how to throw a party.”

“All I need to hear,” Tim says, setting aside the file he’d been working on. “Jon?”

“Ah, no,” Jon says, awkwardly fidgeting with his mug. It’s no different than every other time he’s dodged a social invitation, except that now it feels like everyone can see the fact that he’s lying on his face. “I still have some work on the Blackwood Tapes to do.”

Not entirely a lie. He’s actually a little proud of himself. 

Tim and Sasha have the grace not to exchange a look right in front of him, but he can tell they want to. Sasha pinches her lips to swallow her smile as she turns back toward her computer and Tim coughs and scratches at his nose. Jon treats them to a scowl, but he’s quietly relieved. Let them believe his interest in the tapes is some fun new eccentricity. It’s a hell of a lot better than the truth. 

“We’ll get you to have fun someday, boss,” Tim promises, leaning back in his chair. Or maybe it’s a threat. 

“Don’t count on it,” Jon says dryly, and escapes back to the safety of his office.

*

Elias Bouchard is a strange employer.

Even besides the fact that no one in the building seems to have the professional background you might expect for whatever job they’re doing, the lack of oversight is a continuous surprise. When he’d first assumed the role of Head Archivist not that long ago he’d been floundering, with no direction from Elias and nothing but chaos from Gertrude to build off of. Now, he’s—well, frankly he’s still not sure if he’s moving in the right direction, but at least he’s moving in _a_ direction, even if it’s one of his own making. Before the Blackwood Tapes, that is. He’s relatively certain that this investigation isn’t what Elias intended when he hired him, even if it is technically under the purview of his job.

And that’s what he’s doing. His job. His job just happens to include being at the Institute after hours, picking the lock to his boss’s office while anyone who might have been wandering the halls at this time of day is enjoying the hospitality of Artefact Storage. 

Life, sometimes, is strange. 

“Oh, you’re still here.”

Jon jumps at the sound of Tim’s voice, dropping the paperclips he’d bent out of a useful shape and into those of a makeshift lockpick. 

“HR was going to skin me alive if I didn’t get that Blackwood file back to them,” Tim is saying, apparently unaware or otherwise used to the fact that Jon looks like his soul has left his body. He’d already been to the Artefacts Storage party before remembering about the file, judging by the flush to his cheeks and flippant gesturing. “Don’t have a fit, I know you’re still using it, though you must have the thing memorized by now. I left copies on your desk—are you breaking into Elias’ office?” It’s like his brain abruptly catches up with his eyes.

“No,” Jon says quickly. 

Tim points to the bent paper clips, shining damningly against the drab gray carpet. “What are those?”

Jon looks down. Looks back up. Takes a steadying breath.

“Do you _really_ think _I_ know how to pick locks?” He says, as scathingly incredulous as he can physically be past the panicked pounding of his heart. 

It almost works. He can see the moment’s indecision in Tim’s eyes, supported by everything Tim knows about him. It _should_ have worked. What’s he done that would lead Tim to believe that he would actually be picking the lock to his boss’s office? He’d be insulted if it weren’t true.

“You _are_ ,” Tim says, and at least he has the decency to look shocked. “I—actually, where _did_ you learn how to pick a lock? That’s very...cool.” He says it like _cool_ is the antithesis of _Jonathan Sims._

Jon scowls. Okay, that’s a little too much disbelief. He stoops down and grabs the paperclips off the floor, straightening up against far too primly for someone in the middle of breaking and entering. “I had a rebellious phase,” he says dryly. Let Tim think what he will of _that._ Maybe it’ll distract him from getting Jon fired. “Elias has possession of some of Gertude’s old files. I need them,” he says brusquely, turning back to his work on the door as if that was an entirely reasonable explanation. His hands shake a little as he gets back to work on the lock. 

“Okay.”

Jon pauses, watching Tim out of the corner of his eye. “Okay...what?”

Tim shrugs. “Okay, let’s see where this goes,” he says. “Color me curious.”

Jon scowls again—if he’s not careful, his face will stick that way. “You’re humoring me,” he says, “because you think I’ve lost my mind.” He can’t tell if Tim thinks he’s going to harm Elias’ office or himself, or one in the process of the other. It bothers him more than he’s willing to admit—he’s not a child, he knows what he’s doing, even when it’s admittedly a bad idea. He doesn’t need to be looked after. He remembers, distantly, that Tim has a brother. 

“A bit,” Tim says, “but the party wasn’t great anyway. You have, haven’t you, by the way? Lost your mind?”

Jon rolls his eyes and the lock clicks open. Fine. As long as he gets what he came for, Tim can supervise all he wants. 

Jon has been in Elias’ office a handful of times before, the last of which was when he was offered the position of Head Archivist. It strikes him as a strange place every time, both too big and too small, the air so cold that it feels like it’s sitting on top of your skin. The Institute is an old building, a fact that the Archives reminds them of every day, but Elias’ office manages to look like it was pulled straight out of an anonymous office block. The carpet is thin and gray and industrial, the walls painted off-white. It makes the enormous antique desk carved from dark oak look patently ridiculous, especially with the plain office chair behind it. 

Jon ignores it. Gertrude’s files aren’t going to be secreted away in a desk drawer. Elias might like his office strangely bare, but he still has to keep his things somewhere. Namely, the storage closet in the corner behind the desk. That door isn’t even locked. 

Tim coughs in the plume of dust as Jon flicks on the lights. Beige filing cabinets and industrial shelving lined with neat rows of boxes sit against the walls. 

“What are we looking for, exactly?” Tim whispers behind him.

“I don’t know,” Jon mutters, surveying the shelving at the back of the closet. “A box—tapes, probably. Anything with Gertrude’s name on it.” Anything that looks like Elias might want to keep it from the police, but he doesn’t say that. He doesn’t need Tim thinking he’s dipped even further into the realm of conspiracy. At least not until he has something to show for it. “It will have been moved more recently. Less dust.” 

Unfortunately the boxes are all identical, not the beat-up cardboard ones down in the Archives but a neat, professional olive color with little metal brackets on the front for placing labels. A function that’s gone unused. Jon smothers a sigh and starts prying open their lids, peeking inside each of them, as if it’s only halfway invasive if he doesn’t take the lid all the way off. Tim doesn’t bother to pretend not to sigh as he starts on the other side. 

None of it is quite what he’s expecting, but it’s not what he’s looking for either—letters covered in dark, looping script that look like they belong in the Archives, a box filled entirely with receipts, what looks to be an old lava lamp with a spiderweb crack in the glass and what might be blood on the corner. That one throws him off his rhythm a bit. Frankly, he’d been expecting office supplies.

Two things happen at once. He opens a box and sees familiar rows of tapes with Gertrude’s handwriting on the labels. 

And he hears a doorknob turn. 

Jon doesn’t think. He lunges, grabbing the door to the closet and yanking it closed, hesitating at the last moment so that it doesn’t slam. He gently lets the doorknob turn closed with an imperceptible click. 

Tim turns around. “What are you—”

Shit, the light. Jon slams the light off with one palm and slaps the other over Tim’s mouth. They stand chest to chest in the dark, Jon’s breath scraping against the silence. “Someone’s outside,” he whispers. 

“I wonder who that could be,” Tim hisses. Probably. It’s more than a little muffled by Jon’s hand. 

Jon ignores him, his head tilted like it might help his straining ears. It’s hard to hear through the door, but the thin carpet does little to mask the footsteps as someone crosses the office. There’s the scrape of what might be a desk drawer being open and then closed again, and then a weighty silence. 

His arm is starting to ache, but he’s afraid to move until he knows Elias is gone, until the door has clicked closed again—

More footsteps, growing louder. _Shit._ Coming toward the storage closet. Jon holds his breath, and the footsteps stop. The silence stretches on forever. 

“Hm,” Elias hums outside the door. Then he turns and leaves, the office door closing with a soft rattle. 

Jon waits an extra heartbeat to drop his hand and step back, remembering how to breathe again all at once. Suddenly, now that the danger has passed, he feels a little bit silly. 

He clears his throat and flips the light back on. “Sorry,” he says.

“Right,” Tim says, looking a bit flustered. He runs a hand through his hair. “Um.”

“Anyway,” Jon says. “I think I’ve found it.”

“Oh. Right. Good.”

He checks the box one more time, just long enough to see _M.B._ written on some of the tapes, and pulls it off the shelf with a minor sense of triumph. He hesitates, staring at the hole it leaves behind. A little bit obvious—

“Here,” Tim says, and he pulls the box that contained the letters off the shelf and slides it into the slot the Gertrude tapes left behind. He shrugs. “None of them are labeled anyway. Might throw him off the scent a bit.” 

They don’t say a word until they make it to where the hall splits, one way toward the elevator that goes down to the Archives, another toward where the faint sound of music spills out of the Archive Storage offices. They both hesitate as if by mutual agreement.

“Right,” Jon says, adjusting his grip on the olive box. The tapes aren’t heavy, but it’s an awkward size, especially when he really shouldn’t be seen with it. “Thank you. Not that you did much, but thank you for...” His eyes dart away. “...for caring.” 

It’s strange. Almost uncomfortable. He’s not used to people caring. 

Tim looks up. His eyes keep drawing back to the box, like he regrets letting Jon take it—and not because Elias might find out, he suspects. Jon tolds it a little tighter. Tim smiles faintly. “Sure you don’t want to go to the party?”

“Ah, no thank you,” Jon says awkwardly. “I still have some work to do.”

*

He locks his office door, as if Elias is going to walk through it any moment and blandly ask where Jon got the box sitting on his desk. Or maybe Tim with Sasha on his heels, ready to stage an intervention now that his problem has gotten to the breaking and entering stage. He’s not sure that the latter won’t happen anyway in the morning, but that’s fine. Honestly, that’s part of the reason he’s doing this tonight.

He pulls the lid off the box and sets it aside, running his fingertips over the rows of tapes as if they’re something precious. They’re organized neatly, which is shocking coming from Gertrude, each of them carefully labeled with a set of initials. Some initials are afforded more tapes than others, clustered together in little groups, some of them with dates in the corners. His fingers trace the letters. G.K. and M.S. and S.C.

And M.B. His fingers stop there, an electric zip going up his nerves. His office is dark except for the lamp on his desk, pooling golden light across the surface and casting shadows between the tapes. His eyes dart toward the Blackwood Tapes, the box sitting exactly where he left it, as if waiting for him.

Should he listen to one of the Blackwood tapes first? He always seems to listen to Martin’s tapes exactly when he’s supposed to, like it was predestined. Should he try to be unpredictable, to catch fate in a misstep? He’s not sure he could, even if he tried. 

Whatever he does, it’s what he was always going to do. It’s not something that can be double bluffed or escaped. 

He pulls the first of Gertrude’s tapes out of the box and slips it into place. 

_”November 30th, 2012. Notes on Martin Blackwood, reference librarian at the Magnus Institute, London.”_

Gertrude’s voice does not reflect the disorganized old woman he knows her as. Her voice is like metal against a whetstone, antique in a way that was built to survive. It almost startles Jon into pausing the tape again, his nerves like live wires throwing off sparks, but he’s too close to finding what he came for to hesitate now. He lets the tape play, and he doesn’t think about Gertude leaving herself notes like this, the same way that he did before they found their way into Martin’s hands.

_“It is my suspicion that, in one way or another, Martin Blackwood has been sent to kill me.”_

His finger twitches again, but he doesn’t pause the tape. He knew Gertrude had gone mad, even if she may not sound it. Martin wouldn’t kill anyone—he _couldn’t_ , Jon suspects. He’s...well, he’s _Martin._ Martin who sympathizes with people who see ghosts and are chased by shadows, who says _goodnight_ to tape recorders and trusts that it’ll find its intended recipient. The idea is so unlikely that Jon would laugh, if he had the breath for it. He leans forward, as if to hear better.

_“In the past I have been negligent. Too trusting. Too caught up in the importance of my own work. I knew the signs then, but I didn’t want to see them. I do not intend to make the same mistakes again.”_ Her voice drips with something ice cold that might be rage. 

_“I look everywhere for the fingerprints of the entities now—call it paranoia, but at this point, I would call it only due caution. It’s unsurprising that in a place like the Magnus Institute that people have been touched, but the signs are usually light, or otherwise innocuous. The Dark, the End, the Lonely. These are often of little concern to me._

_“When I first saw Martin Blackwood, I was certain that he was due for the Lonely. He would not be the first adrift young man to fall to the fog. At the time, I’d only hope that it wouldn’t bring Peter Lukas to darken our doorstep. But something nagged at me that there was more to it than that, enough to take a second glance. The more I see of Blackwood, the more convinced I am that he’s been touched by the Web._

_“But why? I suppose it’s not entirely surprising. An absent father and a sick, uncaring mother, a history with financial hardship and struggle. It is a mistake to characterize the Web as simply the need to control. In my experience, it preys just as much on the need to _be_ controlled. A man like that, a caretaker all his life, underappreciated, overworked...you can see the allure. The desire to let go. It’s as much a predilection of the Web as the Lonely, in the maddening way of the entities to criss and cross over one another. _

_“I do not believe at this time that Blackwood is aware of it, but if he is here and the Web is at work, it is no accident, I’m sure of it. In the past I have foolishly taken comfort in the idea that the Web has no designs toward a ritual, that it prefers the world exactly as it is, but I can’t afford to assume. Especially not when it is just as likely that it desires not for a ritual, but simply for a world where I am not alive to disrupt it._

_“I’ve offered Martin Blackwood a job at the Archives, as an archival assistant. I want to know more before deciding a course of action, if any. If the Web is at work, I intend for it to be exactly where I can see it.” Click._

__Jon sits long after the tape has run out, his breath frozen in his lungs. _The Web._ The words run circles around his mind, senseless but haunting. _The Web, the Web, the Web._ He doesn't know what that means, doesn't know if Gertude is anything but a mad old woman after all, but if it’s really that simple, why is it so hard to breathe? Why is it that all he can think about is a children’s book with a fat black spider grinning from the cover, and the sound of knuckles knocking against a wooden door? Bile rises in his throat._ _

__He sees movement out of the corner of his eye and he moves without thinking, faster than he normally ever would, and smacks the heel of his hand against his desk. The sound—skin against wood—makes him flinch. When he pulls it back again, his hand shaking, there’s a little black spider flattened against the surface._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> trust me, no one is more disappointed than me that martin isn't in this chapter. don't think I didn't consider sneaking him in somehow. 
> 
> thank you for the comments and kudos!! <3 you can also find me on tumblr at [divineatrophy](https://divineatrophy.tumblr.com/), twitter at [ blueskiddoodle](https://twitter.com/blueskiddoodle), and in a small glass jar with a stick in it.


	4. Chapter 4

_“...I want to try something.”_ Martin’s voice, careful and a little shy, always underscored by the soft whisper of the tape running. _“It’s—okay, I don’t know how this stuff works exactly, but I’ve been thinking about it—I’ve been thinking about it a_ lot—” A huff of self-depreciative laughter. _“—and I think we might be able to communicate somehow. Like, actually talk, I mean.”_

Jon pauses the tape and scrubs his hands down his face, even though he knows by now that he can’t will away the dark circles under his eyes. This is the first time he’s been brave enough to listen to another of the Blackwood tapes and it’s—

It’s been a long week.

He didn’t sleep after listening to the Gertrude tape. He didn’t even go home. He listened to the tape twice more, jotting down notes in a crumpled notebook that he found in his desk, hoping that that won’t find its way into Martin Blackwood’s hands too. He spent the night laying on the cot in the back storage room, his legs bent where they threaten to hang off the end as he replayed the tape over in his mind a thousand times more, until Gertrude’s voice started to sound like his own. He memorized the faults in the darkened ceiling.

It’s been three days since then, and he hasn’t gotten much sleep otherwise, except for snatches of it stolen accidentally over his desk, sometimes in the middle of reading a particularly mundane, non-Blackwood statement. He tells himself that it’s important to put some effort into his real job for a little while, if only to throw off the concerned looks Tim keeps shooting him when he thinks Jon isn’t looking. Not to mention Elias, who doesn’t look at him any particular way, but the idea that he knows what happened scrapes against Jon’s sleep-deprived paranoia like a raw nerve. He’s not avoiding his coworkers, he thinks, no matter how many bruises he has on his shins from hasty getaways that walked him straight into desk corners and door frames and once, famously, the break room refrigerator. 

He’s not avoiding _anyone._ And he’s most certainly not avoiding Martin. He’s just...busy.

He breaks on the third day, late enough that it’s nearly the fourth day, according to his watch. Another night on the cot. It’s murder on his back, but at least it saves on his morning commute. He allows himself to smile at his own pathetic attempt at a joke before his eyes fall on the tape again, waiting for him patiently. Somewhere, three years in the past, Martin doesn’t even know he’s paused it. 

Does he miss Martin, or does he miss the mystery? It’s hard to tell, the two of them so tangled together that it’s impossible to extract one from the other. He knows he’s avoided Martin because he doesn’t know what to say, but not saying anything at all feels just as damning as the truth. He’s already accidentally burdened Martin with the knowledge of his own disappearance, how is he supposed to tell him that he’s only in the Archives at all because Gertrude thought he was part of some sort of scheme—some sort of—

Well. He doesn’t know. That’s another part of his problem, he supposes. Jon rubs at his forearm, pushing away the sensation of imaginary spiders. 

_“Time doesn’t work the same for us, I don’t think,”_ Martin says when the tape resumes, and it’s pathetic, the way his voice untangles and pushes aside Jon’s thoughts. Maybe he’s jealous of Martin’s ignorance, safe in the past, if only for the moment. Maybe he just likes the cadence of his voice. _“It’s not that the rules are broken, just...different. So we just have to figure them out.”_

He sounds so confident that Jon’s heart briefly aches, startling him. How can Martin care so much, knowing what happens to him? How can he waste what time he has left here, talking to Jon? He should be off...climbing mountains or skydiving or whatever it is that people do when they’ve been told just how much time they have left. When their death becomes real and not just something unfortunate that happens to other people. 

_“...Actually, it might be easier to just do it, than try to explain,”_ Martin says, breaking the train of thought. There’s a palpable excitement in his voice now, barely restrained. Jon imagines him somewhere in the Archives—not Gertrude’s office, surely, but maybe the storage closet that’s become his home away from home, or the cramped little interview room off the hallway. He must be leaning over the tape recorder, biting his bottom lip to hide a smile. Or maybe not. Maybe Jon’s the only one who has to pretend when he’s not pleased with himself. _“Try recording yourself as you listen to this—oh, and wear headphones, please. The last thing I want to do is hear myself through this thing. I feel sorry enough for you.”_ He audibly shudders with theatrical effect that makes Jon’s smile twitch. _“I know it sounds silly, Jon, but just_ try _. I’ll um—wait a bit—or I supposed you can just pause it, can’t you? Ahh...”_

Jon pauses the tape, his heart pounding as what Martin is really saying sinks in for the first time. _Actually talk_ —is that what he said? As if on the phone? Jon’s eyes dart to his cellphone sitting on the desk, as if expecting it to ring. How are they supposed to do that? It won’t work. It won’t—

He stands hurriedly, nearly knocking the tape recorder off his desk, his hands shaking with a fresh shot of adrenaline. He glances nervously at his office door—it’s going on midnight, but he can’t stop imagining it opening on him talking to himself. He pauses for a moment, just long enough to contemplate the absurdity of the whole situation, before scooping up his things and beating a hasty retreat to the storage closet.

* 

What results is the world’s most pathetic recording studio.

Jon sits cross-legged on the cot, the tape recorder sitting next to him. It took him the better part of twenty minutes to dig out a pair of old over-the-ear headphones with a jack that matches the tape recorder. They’re not even vintage enough to be considered cool again, but the flimsy plastic-and-foam kind from the early 2000’s that release little puffs of dust every time he adjusts them. A glass of water sits on the ground next to the cot, in case his mouth gets dry. All in all, he looks more like a man about to go to war than one about to have a conversation. 

Why is he so _nervous?_

He flips the voice recorder around in his hand, rubbing at the side with his thumb until the plastic creaks. Whatever Martin’s thinking, it’s not going to work anyway. This is ridiculous. A waste of time. This—

He leans over and presses play.

_“Okay...ready when you are.”_ Martin’s voice, suddenly very close through the headphones, makes him jump. _“Just...say anything, I suppose.”_ He laughs nervously. 

His breath caught in his throat, Jon holds the voice recorder up to his mouth. He clears his throat and hits record. “Hello,” he says, his voice coming out awkwardly deep. Why did he do that? He doesn’t sound like that. He resists the urge to end the recording and throw the whole thing in the bin. 

The silence stretches so long it’s painful, and only the gentle sound of Martin’s breathing lets him know that he’s still there. _“I’m going to trust that you actually did it,”_ Martin says at last, a wry twist to his voice. There’s a shuffle of movement. _“Now if it’s anything like it’s been before, it should be somewhere around—oh.”_ The click-scrape of plastic against wood makes Jon’s heart skip a beat. Is that—

There’s the familiar rustle of slipping a tape into place and then— _“Hello."_

Jon’s heart stops. That’s his voice, distant and scratchy, distorted twice over by the limits of the tape. He almost forgets about the voice recorder now hanging limp in his hand. 

“How did you—”

_“Oh my god, it worked—”_

“This is impossible—”

_“I can’t believe it—”_

Their voices overlap one another, Jon’s repeated through the recording, until they’re reduced to indecipherable babbling, cut through only by Martin’s delighted laughter. 

_“Hold on, hold on. I’ve got headphones around here somewhere—”_ There’s another shuffle of movement, and Jon, sitting frozen on the cot, wonders if Martin is holding the same dusty old headphones he’s wearing himself. He hears the jack click into place. _“Okay, sorry about that. I kind of didn’t really expect that to work,”_ Martin says. _“It should, um, be good now.”_

Jon hesitates. “How did...how is this happening?” he asks slowly. 

There’s a slight delay—maybe their timing is slightly off, or time traveling tape recorders aren’t the most effective form of communication. But he hears Martin smile. _“Well, it’s—okay, it makes_ no sense, but I was thinking, what about this does _? Like I said before, it’s not that there aren’t any rules, just that they’re different.”_ He’s talking fast now, and Jon can imagine him gesticulating (does he talk with his hands? sometimes he has to remind himself that there are so many things he doesn’t know). _“So I got to thinking—what if we forced its hand? Whatever is at work here, what if we made it play by its own impossible rules?”_

“I...I’m not sure I follow,” Jon says, but Martin’s giddiness is infectious. Or maybe it’s just hearing his voice, confined to the tape as much as it was before but impossibly more real now in a way that’s just as hard to explain. _Impossible_. They can’t stop saying that word, but here they are. 

_“The tape I’m recording right now can’t exist without yours to respond to, and yours can’t exist without mine existing in the first place, telling you to record it. So they...well...force each other to exist? I suppose? Have you ever seen Doctor Who?”_

Jon huffs a laugh. “No, Martin, I have not seen Doctor Who,” he lies. 

_“I’m not sure I believe that,”_ Martin says with such unmistakable fondness that Jon feels his cheeks grow warm. He almost clears his throat before remembering that Martin can hear him now. The realization sends a new thrill up his spine. _Impossible, impossible, impossible._

_“But, you know, aside from all that, I guess what I wanted to say is, um…”_ There’s a burst of rustling as Martin fusses with the recorder—and then shyly, _“...hello, Jon.”_

Jon is surprised to find himself grinning, one hand pressed against the headphones as if to hold them there, as if not to miss a single word. “Hello, Martin.”

*

They establish a system for their conversations very quickly.

They have to move carefully, or at least Martin does—he’s still working under Gertrude, and he still has to record statements as if nothing has happened. Once Jon would have scoffed, certain that Gertrude wouldn’t notice if Martin juggled cantaloupes in the middle of the Archives, given the state she left them in, but too much has changed, including his perception of his predecessor. Gertrude was more than she let on, and Jon knows now just how carefully she’s watching.

Which he doesn’t tell Martin. Which he _can’t_ tell Martin, outside of the gentle push that yes, best they keep this between themselves for now, can’t be too careful. Not until he knows what happens to Martin, why he disappears and where he goes. Not until Jon knows that he’s not, somehow, the one who causes it. 

Until then, any more knowledge of the future stays with him.

Which is why he can’t listen to the tapes in rapid succession, however much he might want to sometimes. He needs time more than anything, and strangely, that’s the one thing he has. In a way. They decide that Jon will tell Martin the date on his end and Martin will put it on the tape’s label, another bit of impossible logic that ensures that Jon won’t listen to the tapes ahead of schedule or out of order. Jon can see them all in the Blackwood Tapes box, his own future staring back at him. What would happen if he listened ahead, chose one at random and didn’t record? Would he hear Martin talking to a man who doesn’t exist yet? Or would fate be one step ahead of him, as it has so far? He starts leaving early with headaches more often, only to come back at night, when he can work unseen and unnoticed. 

He scours the Gertrude tapes for more information on the Web, those regarding Martin and otherwise, fast-forwarding through the less interesting notes on work travel and health concerns, but he’s yet to find anything useful. Or rather, she’s probably saying a good many useful things, only he doesn’t have the context to understand them. She’s speaking another language, and he’s without a Rosetta stone. 

Their new rules mean that Martin’s asides to him at the end of his recorded statements disappear, though Jon swears that Martin is doing an impression of him every time he records notes on a statement that was particularly unbelievable. He still listens to them, on the off-chance there will be something important there. That, and the careful cadence of Martin’s voice helps push his headache to the side for a bit.

He’s sitting in his office, contemplatively scribbling a spider in black pen ink as he listens to Martin read the statement of a man whose daughter allegedly fell down a never-ending well, when something changes. 

_“Martin, are you—oh, sorry, you’re busy.”_

_“Gerry! Oh, no—just finishing up. Back already? Thought you and Gertrude would be out until the end of the week at least.”_ Something scrapes softly against wood—Martin fidgeting with the tape recorder, probably. 

Jon tilts his head curiously, jotting a note on the legal pad under his hand, already messy with statement numbers and speculation. He keeps it carefully locked in his desk drawer when not in use, but he hopes that his handwriting will dissuade further investigation anyway. 

Gerard Keay. Not an official employee at the Institute as far as he can tell, but if Gertrude’s tapes are anything to go by, functionally so. Gertrude has a lot to say about his mother, but nothing immediately relevant to the situation at hand.

_“We finished up early. Turns out Prague doesn’t hold as many secrets as she thought it did,”_ Gerard--Gerry, he supposes--says wryly. He pauses. _“Does she still have you recording statements then?”_

_“What? Oh, yes, still on that—don’t give me that look, it’s really not so bad. I actually kind of...kind of like it,”_ Martin says. _“It’s…”_

_“Like a hamster running in a wheel?”_

Martin laughs. _“It’s interesting,”_ he says. _“I’d rather be here than sitting around airport terminals with Gertrude all the time.”_

_“Fair enough.”_ Gerry huffs a laugh, and Jon is struck by the easy camaraderie between them, the way they talk the same way he would to Tim or Sasha. He didn’t realize before how much he thinks of Martin as someone uniquely his and not a person with a whole, fully-realized life, however long ago it might have been. _“I’ll leave you to it then. Fall asleep if you’d like. Swear I won’t tell.”_

_“Wait.”_

_“Yeah?”_

Martin hesitates so long that Jon leans forward to check that the tape is still running. _“What would you do if you knew when you were going to die?”_

_“Realistically? Sit around airport terminals with Gertrude,”_ Gerry laughs. _“Didn’t take you for the morbid type, Martin.”_

_“Oh, you know...just thinking. Hard not to, with all...this, I suppose.”_

_“Told you that recording those things would melt your brain.”_ A pause. _“Well?”_

Martin audibly startles. _“What?”_

_“What would you do?”_

_“I…”_ Martin’s voice falters. He laughs softly. _“Sit here recording statements, I suppose.”_

_“We’re an exciting bunch, aren’t we?”_

Martin waits until the door closes again to heave a sigh, the kind you save for when no one is listening. _“We certainly are that,”_ he mutters to himself, almost obscured by the sound of shuffling paper.

Jon can hear the moment he realizes that the tape is still rolling. 

_“...bet you heard all that, didn’t you?”_ Martin says, and Jon feels the strange start he always does when Martin speaks to him directly, caught unaware by a surreal kind of excitement every time. _“What are the chances we can forget you did?”_ He laughs softly, but there’s no humor to it. _“Right. Probably not.”_ He sighs again, softer this time.

_“It’s fine, Jon. Really. I’m...fine. I know I shouldn’t be, but...I don’t know. Nothing much I can do about it, is there? It’s already happened.”_

He smiles. Jon can hear him smiling, even as he imagines it soft and sad. _“I’m glad you’re here with me, Jon. Really. I am.” Click._

Jon’s pen digs into the paper, his eyes caught on the lines but not really seeing them. Resolve is a surprisingly quiet feeling, still but deep inside of him. It’s certainty, a decision that he already made, he just didn’t realize it yet. It’s not enough to know what happened to Martin. It’s not enough to simply understand. It’s not enough to be the disquiet voyeur, the way he always is, safe on the other side of the tape recorder. He has to do more.

He has to save Martin Blackwood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's martin time!! extra martin to make up for last chapter's horrible martin deficiency 
> 
> tysm for the comments and kudos!! I swear I'll get to responding to last chapter's comments but!! I was too excited to wait to get this chapter out fnggkfh. anyway ty ily your comments are the wind beneath my wings.
> 
> you can also find me on tumblr at [divineatrophy](https://divineatrophy.tumblr.com/), twitter at [blueskiddoodle](https://twitter.com/blueskiddoodle), and secretly on your discord server.


	5. Chapter 5

The police, predictably, are not astoundingly helpful. 

Jon has the police report for Martin’s disappearance, at least as much of it as Tim could dig up, but it leaves a lot to be desired. No evidence of foul play, no history that might point them in any sort of direction. Just a man who was there one day and gone the next. Not much else to say.

Except that there has to be. There are too many variables involved for it to be that simple. He contacts the officer that wrote the report, one Constable Basira Hussain, and gets a two-line email in response. A missing persons case that’s been cold for over a year is not on the top of their agenda. 

It’s frustrating--Tim or Sasha could probably do better, through charm or cleverness or simple experience navigating an unwilling police force, but he’s not desperate enough to ask for their help just yet. They’re too smart to accept simple answers, because the only simple answers would be lies.

Martin, for his part, appears to be aggressively ignoring the situation, even as Jon listens to the dates on his recorded statements progress steadily. For him, it’s August 2013. A little over a year before he disappears. 

_“You wouldn’t believe what happened,”_ Martin says one night, late into June 2016, when Jon is sitting on his cot, dusty headphones pushing his hair into disarray. As almost disarmingly normal as his conversations with Martin have become, he still won’t record them in his office. The storage room is a false sense of security, he knows, but it’s better than nothing.

“You found a different pen pal from the future?” Jon says blandly. “Martin, I’m green with envy.”

Martin laughs--he likes it when Martin laughs. It’s a welcome reprieve from the dreary horror of the statements day in and out, even if it all feels a bit like gallows humor, knowing the full scope of their situation. _“Where would I find the time for that?”_ Martin teases, but Jon can tell he’s distracted. He cocks his head, tapping his fingers contemplatively against the tape recorder. Sometimes, even when he’s touching the hard plastic, he forgets that it’s technically a tape he’s talking to. _“I saw you.”_

Jon’s fingers go still and his heart skips a beat. “You what?”

_“I didn’t--I wasn’t _looking_ for you. I mean, I’ve thought about it, like doing a google search or something, but it felt a bit...creepy? You won’t know me for another two years. And, well, I just sort of--ran into you, really. Down in Research. I was looking into a lead on statement follow-up and about had a heart attack when you started to speak.”_ Martin laughs sheepishly. _“Of course I dropped the file I was holding. Paper everywhere. You can imagine your response.”_

Jon groans and runs both hands down his face, nearly upsetting the headphones. “Good lord,” he says. “I can--yes, I can imagine it.” What was he doing in 2013? Probably still researching that 1834 haunting that made him want to pull his hair out, which didn’t bode well for anyone stumbling past his desk and throwing papers everywhere. He cringes. Probably for the best that his 2013 self didn’t see the interaction as anything worth remembering. 

_“I did think the bowtie was cute,”_ Martin says slyly. _“Very Matt Smith. I knew you were lying about not having seen Doctor Who.”_

Jon groans again, leaning back against the shelving behind him. “Please never mention the bowtie again.”

_“Can you tell me who they’re casting as the Twelfth Doctor? I could win a few bets.”_

_“Martin.”_

Martin laughs. _“I know, I know. We’re probably pushing the envelope on spooky time magic as it is,”_ he says. _“Still, it was...cool. Seeing you. Makes it more like you’re real and not just some weird, fussy fever dream.”_

Jon watches the tape spin, his fingertips resting gently on top of the recorder. Words press against his lips, but he bites them back. None of them are productive, just sentimental nonsense. _I wish you could have told me who were are, I wish I would have believed you, I wish any of this was different._ He has a feeling that it’s not anything that Martin doesn’t already know.

_“Anyway,”_ Martin says, _“I’d better be off then. Until next time.”_ Then, always as softly as the first time he said it: _“Goodnight, Jon.”_

“Goodnight, Martin,” he murmurs back.

Jon suppresses a sigh, in case Martin is still listening, and closes his eyes, his head resting against the hard edge of the metal shelving. He’s so tired, and not just because of the late hour. He can feel the bags under his eyes like a physical weight, the impossibility of the situation holding him back at every turn. He needs to try harder, work faster. He needs to do _something._ The tape continues to run, the steady whir-click like sand in an hourglass. 

_“Don’t stop the tape.”_

Jon’s eyes snap open. That’s not Martin’s voice.

_“I know you’re listening. You always are. Say something.”_

Jon unsticks his tongue from the roof of his mouth. “Gerard Keay.”

_“Shit.”_ Gerry laughs softly, astonishment clear in his voice. _“You really are listening.”_

Jon sits forward, his heart hammering in his chest. He doesn’t know what to do. He doesn’t even know what to ask. Besides the obvious. “Did something happen to Martin?”

It can’t have--it’s nothing good, but he still _knows_ what happens to Martin, and it’s too soon. In his timeline at least. It’s the one terrible perk of their misplacement in time, but that doesn’t stop a shot of adrenaline from making Jon’s handles tremble.

_“He’s fine,”_ Gerry says, unimpressed by his concern. _“As fine as anyone with a secret in the Archives can be.”_

Jon tries to keep his breath of relief from being audible. To the other concern at hand. “How do you know about me?” He doesn’t mean the hard edge that creeps into his voice, the suspicion undeniable. If Gerry knows, then there’s the high possibility that Gertrude knows, and if Gertrude knows--

He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know what any of this means. He strikes the cot frame with the heel of his hand.

_“Jesus! Was that necessary?”_ Gerry says. _“I’m not an idiot, to start. I noticed things. And I know things. Sometimes more than I should.”_ A pause. _“Suppose that hasn’t started happening to you yet? If you are who you say you are.”_

Jon hesitates. “I don’t know,” he says. With everything that’s happened already, he’s not sure he’d even notice. “I don’t think so.

_“It’s still early yet.”_ Gerry breathes a gusty sigh. _“What do you want from him then? If it’s true, if Gertrude is dead, you’ve got enough to deal with without messing about with Martin.”_ He hesitates. _“I listened to the tapes. I heard what you said. What happens to him. That’s...that’s bad luck.”_

“You don’t sound surprised.”

_“Things like that happen at the Institute. In the whole world, really. There’s no use pretending like they don’t.”_

Jon wets his lips, holding the tip of his tongue between his teeth. “I’m going to save him,” he says, and it feels like making some sort of promise. It’s the first time he’s said it out loud, even to himself. 

_“You’re an idiot.”_

“I don’t care.”

_“Time doesn’t work that way. If you had saved him, it already would have happened.”_

“You haven’t asked what happens to you,” Jon says in a low voice, sharp and vindictive. It’s not fair, twisting the knife before Gerry even knows it’s there, but he’s never been nice when he’s backed into a corner. He bites his tongue a moment too late. “Sorry.”

Gerry is quiet for a long moment, the silence heavy. “When?” 

“Not long before Martin’s disappearance,” Jon says. “Do you want to...know? Erm...how?”

Another lengthy pause. “No point in it,” Gerry says gruffly. “I told you, it can’t be changed anyway. I’d rather not waste the time I’ve got left bracing for it.”

“Right,” Jon says softly. 

“Was there a book?” Gerry says suddenly.

“A--A what?” Jon stammers, as if he’d never heard of one before. The shift in tone is so sudden it gives him whiplash. 

“A book, in Gertrude’s things,” he says impatiently. “Thick. Old. Written largely in Sanskrit. The pages are made from human skin. You really can’t miss it.”

Sanskrit? _Human skin?_ “No. I mean--she left the place a mess, but no, I haven’t seen a book like...like _that._ ” Jon tries to swallow his nerves, but a cold sweat sticks his shirt to his chest, and he’s very aware of his own pulse. “Why? What’s important about this book?”

“It’s called the Catalogue of the Trapped Dead,” Gerry says. He sighs. “And if I know anything about how god-awful shit my life is, I’m probably in it.”

*

“Constable Hussein! Con-- _Basira!_ ”

Finally, the constable stops, pausing on the steps that lead up to the station to turn back at him, her face a stony mask of--not even impatience. She’s just waiting, her expression so impenetrable that Jon falters, still wheezing from the way he had to run down the street to catch up with her.

“Ah,” he says awkwardly. “You haven’t responded to my calls.”

“I’ve been ignoring your calls, Mr. Sims,” Basira says matter-of-factly. She starts to turn away again.

“I--” Jon stumbles, flustered. “It’s important!” 

She narrows her eyes. “Are you one of those podcast people then?” She all but demands. She’s standing two steps above his, lending her an increased ability to loom over him. “Picking apart someone else’s tragedy for entertainment value? Or are you one of those who thinks they can solve it, since they’re so clever?” She shakes her head. “I don’t have time for this. I’ve got real work to do, thanks.”

“Wait.” The weight in his voice surprises both of them, at least enough that Basira hesitates a moment longer. “Just one question. I swear.” He wets his lips nervously. This is the part where he starts to sound like a madman, and that’s with the time travel bits edited out. “When you investigated Martin Blackwood’s case was there--was there a book? Old. Very old. The pages would be, um…” He gestures vaguely. How do you say _human skin_ nicely? “Strange. Leathery, perhaps.”

Basira is staring now, her eyes drilling holes into him. Jon fidgets nervously with the strap of his bag.

“I’m only trying to help,” Jon says quietly. “I--I don’t even have a podcast.”

Basira holds his gaze for a moment longer. “Stay out of it,” she says, and each word is weighted like a punch. “Cases like this...you’re better off. Trust me.” She turns away.

“I don’t have a choice,” Jon snaps, his patience running out along with his options. His grip on his bag is so tight that it hurts.

Basira doesn’t look back.

*

The next morning starts with Sasha pushing something into his hand.

“What’s this?” Jon says, staring blearily down at the cardboard cup. It’s warm, at least. It may be summer outside, but the Archives are always hideously cold, even if he’s only just arrived. 

Arrived late, actually, now that he sees the time. No wonder Sasha is giving him that concerned look.

“Caffeine,” she says, offering him a smile. “Thought you could use it.”

He frowns, his eyebrows furrowed. “Do I look that bad?” He certainly feels that bad. His late nights spent on the cot are catching up with him, and his failures too. He’s starting to grow envious of Martin Blackwood. Disappearing doesn’t sound so bad.

“I wasn’t going to say that,” Sasha said. “But.”

Jon smiles wearily. “But,” he agrees. “Thank you.” He tips the cup in a little cheers and makes for his office. No avoiding it forever.

“Oh, right,” Sasha says. “There was something here to see you. Didn’t give her name, but she left something on your desk for you.”

Jon freezes, his heart stuttering. “Oh? Thank you,” he says, struggling to keep his voice even. “I’ll take a look.”

He fumbles with the key to unlock his office, his hands suddenly graceless. The constable? She certainly didn’t seem likely to change her mind the day before. He slaps the lightswitch and closes the door behind him, carelessly letting his bag drop to the floor. He can see it, a package wrapped in newspaper sitting on his desk, thick and rather book-shaped.

He double-checks that the door is locked before he goes to his desk, resting his fingers thoughtfully against the top of the package before he tears open the newspaper, unable to take the anticipation a moment longer. A note, a folded piece of lined paper, sticks out of the torn newspaper. He flips it open to find it unsigned, with only a simple message in stern handwriting.

_Don’t mention it. Seriously._

He smiles despite himself. Either Constable Hussain decided that podcasts weren’t so bad after all, or she believed him. 

Jon set the note aside and pulled the book from the newspaper. For all of Gerry’s description, or maybe because of it, he wasn’t sure exactly what to expect. The book sits strangely in his hands, heavier than it should be, like there’s more to its weight than just the space it takes up. The cover is made from leather, dyed and embossed with a language he doesn’t recognize. A shiver crawls up his spine,and he tries not to think about where the leather might have come from.

The spine creaks as he opens it, the pages rustling stifling against one another. He should stop. He should put it away, forget about it, or at least wait until nightfall, when Tim and Sasha aren’t somewhere on the other side of his office door. But he doesn't. That’s always been his problem, has it? Never could leave well enough alone.

Gerard Keay’s page sits at the very end.

Terror grips his spine, holding him in place, and for a moment he thinks he’s going to be sick. This page is different from the one before it, mottled strangely underneath the words, like it had been damaged once. Or scarred. The words are still legible, staring back at him in heavy, black ink.

Jon opens his mouth and reads.

Gerard Keay’s death slips out of his mouth and into the open air, pulling the temperature down until Jon’s breath shivers with every word. For a moment, it’s like he’s there, lying in a hospital bed, his eyes closed but distantly aware of more than just his surroundings. Of reality. Of what was happening to him. The fear of what came next, or what didn’t.

“...and so Gerard Keay ended.” There’s a ringing in his ears. He braces his hands against the desk to steady himself, the book spread open between them. A tear slides down his nose and trembles there for a heartbeat before it drops. Jon numbly raises his hand to his eye. He hadn’t realized he was crying.

“Jon? Jonathan Sims?”

Jon’s head jerks back up, his breath caught in his throat. It takes a moment for his eyes to focus on the figure in front of him--they don’t want to, or maybe the figure itself isn’t meant to be seen. It stands transposed strangely against reality, exuding a gentle sense of wrongness that makes every animal instinct humanity tried to breed out shiver in terror. 

Jon swallows painfully. “Gerard,” he says.

One corner of Gerry’s mouth ticks up in a humorless smile. “And I’m in that fucking book. It’s a bitch being right sometimes,” he says. He looks around. “Love what you’ve done with the place.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I DID tweak the book's journey just a smidge--as fun as a quick trip to america and back would have been, gertrude gets it back to the archives in this timeline. after that, we'll find out how it ended up evidence in martin's disappearance (; 
> 
> thank you for the kudos and comments, they mean a lot!! <3 you can also find me on tumblr at [divineatrophy](https://divineatrophy.tumblr.com/), twitter at [blueskiddoodle](https://twitter.com/blueskiddoodle), and stuck behind you in morning traffic.


	6. Chapter 6

There’s a ghost in his office and all Jon can think is _well, this might as well happen._

Skepticism is a relief sometimes, a blanket to pull around his shoulders when the possibility of the truth is too much. A way to turn off his mind, or at least focus it on something else, on doubt instead of fear. It’s natural. It’s human.

But there’s no denying this. 

Gerry tilts his head, his ghostly eyes flashing strangely in the overhead light. He’s there but not quite, he’s a stutter in reality, like if you held the film up to the light you’d see him there as a flaw in the frame. It makes him hard to focus on, as if Jon’s brain is trying desperately to let the aberration slip past it. “You look...surprised,” he says, a wry twist to his voice, and Jon exhales, not quite a laugh, at the understatement. Gerry looks just as surprised, or maybe just confused, his eyebrows furrowed. “How much do you know about the Magnus Institute exactly?”

Jon hesitates. There’s the obvious answer, the one in garish green text on gray on the Institute’s outdated website, but he gets the feeling that that’s not what Gerry is asking. 

He doesn’t get a chance to answer. Gerry must see all he needs to know right there on his face. “Ah,” he says. “You really _are_ new.”

Jon leans back against his desk, his hands shaking. “You’re dead,” he says, rubbing his forehead like he can physically smooth out the wrinkles forming there. “You’re...dead.”

“Oh, well, obviously,” Gerry says impatiently. “I mean, you knew that before I did, didn’t you?”

Jon exhales again, this one a bit more like a laugh, if one verging on hysteria. “Yes, well, that’s a bit different from…” He gestures vaguely. “...this!” 

“You don’t have to be weird about it.”

Okay. Okay. Okayokayokay. He needs to focus. He runs his hand through his hair, letting the tug on his scalp center him again. “Okay, let’s just…” He needs more information. Life, even the strangest parts, is easier to process when it can be organized into boxes. He just needs to build them. “Did you ever talk to me again?” He asks, his voice already steadier as he slips into business. “After the first time?”

“No,” Gerry answers easily. “I figured I was either in the book or I wasn’t, and I didn’t really fancy wasting whatever left I had left on some harebrained scheme for the future. I had enough problems of my own. Still do, really.”

Okay, at least they don’t have to worry about _that_. The idea of present Gerry having spoken to future Jon in the past is...well, his head hurts enough as it is.

“You died not long before Martin’s disappearance,” he presses on. “Do you remember anything...off? Anything that might explain what happened?” He barely has the words out before his heart sinks at the way Gerry averts his eyes. “You don’t,” he says.

“Like I said, I had problems of my own,” Gerry says cagily, “and that’s not counting the undiagnosed brain cancer. I...I wasn’t around the Archives much, toward the end.” He pauses. “Sorry.”

He almost strikes his desk in frustration—almost, before he remembers that Tim and Sasha are still outside his office door. His windowless office makes it easy to forget sometimes that it’s still daylight outside and that other people are out there living their ordinary lives, wrapped up in their own ordinary tragedies. 

“I told you from the start, Jon, there’s no changing what’s already happened—”

“Yes, yes, and I’m an idiot, thank you,” Jon snaps, still barely remembering to keep his voice down. His eyes itch with something between exhaustion and bitter, frustrated tears. How is he supposed to hear Martin’s voice again, knowing that he’s come so far with nothing to show for it? How is he supposed to listen to Martin’s enduring practicality, his weary acceptance of his own fate, without tearing out his own hair? How is he supposed to do this, any of this?

“I can still help you,” Gerry says, leaning forward and snapping his fingers in front of Jon’s face. They don’t make a sound, but the shimmering movement is enough to get his attention. “I can fill you in on what Gertrude knew—which isn’t really anything more than you _should_ already know, but who am I to judge.” He leans back again. He looks haggard, his face thin and his eyes deep set, almost hidden by the limp fall of his hair. This must have been how he looked that last year before he died. “But listen. I didn’t tell you about the book so that I could follow you on a fool’s errand.”

Betrayal cuts Jon deep and quick before he thinks better of it. Of course. He forgets that not everyone in the world is so tangled up in the need to save Martin Blackwood from a fate that’s already found him. “What do you want?” He asks warily. 

“I knew that if there was any possibility that I ended up in this book, you were my only chance to get out of it,” Gerry says, his voice low and serious. His eyes are haunting like this, cast in shadow yet also unnaturally bright. It’s hard to look at him for too long, but Jon can’t bear to look away. Gerard Keay is, was, will always be a tragedy, just as much as Martin. The difference is that Jon knows that he can’t save him. All he can do is witness. 

“I don’t…”Jon says uncertainly. “I don’t think I can...bring you back.” The rabbit hole goes deeper than he can even know right now, but he doubts it goes there.

Gerry snorts. “I don’t want you to save me, Jon,” he says. “I want you to kill me.”

*

Is it ethical to kill a ghost?

The question has been haunting him ( _ha_ ) for the better part of the week, and Jon still doesn’t have any answers. Or maybe he does, and the answer is that it doesn’t matter. He needs Gerry, and Gerry made him swear to burn his page, in exchange for information. Jon likes to think of himself as a man of his word.

And yet he’s been in no hurry to rush through their lessons. It’s not entirely his fault. There’s a lot that he doesn’t know and a lot that Gerry _does_ , and he isn’t taking any chances when it comes to missing the details. He already has three notebooks full of precise notes and cluttered in the margins with statement numbers that he suspects might be related. Entities, avatars, fear—once he has the verbiage, it’s impossible not to see them in all but the most unlikely of statements.

That, and it takes its toll on the both of them. Gerry can’t maintain his form for too long. Or he can, but it hurts. Jon can see it on his face. The book might be a prison, but being outside of it takes effort, like the world of the living refuses to abide by the lingering of the dead. 

For Jon it’s headaches. It’s too much, too fast, he thinks. After a while, focusing on Gerry’s voice makes his eyes itch and his forehead pound, and he can feel all of it press at the seams of his skull. He goes home early with migraines, sometimes, and comes back to printouts about medication and trial treatments conveniently left on the break room table. They seem to be getting worse with time, until he’s not sure they even fade completely, but that doesn't stop him from opening the book again. It’s almost addicting, connecting the pieces together and watching the map of a new world spread out across the line pages of his notebook.

That, and the panic attacks. 

“Martin,” he says one night, tucked into the corner of the storage room. He’s sitting on the floor, the cold seeping up through his legs, but the press of the wall against his shoulder is comforting. He sits with his knees pulled up to his chest, his head resting against the wall so that the headphones press against his ear. The tape recorder whirs quietly beside him. “How much do you...know?”

_“...know?”_ Martin repeats hesitantly. They don’t talk about these things, the way they don’t talk about Martin’s fate. They side step around it carefully, like they’re walking hand in hand across a minefield. The truth is always there, so close they could almost touch it, but they always flinch first, one of them or the other. It’s easier that way. _“Like…”_

It’s easier, but things have stopped being easy. Jon swallows painfully. “Yes,” he says softly, unanswering the unspoken question.

Martin is quiet for a moment. _“I know...enough,”_ he hedges. _“Enough to do my job, I mean. Whatever that means.”_ A self-deprecating huff. _“But...yeah. Yes. I know.”_

Jon’s mouth is dry, his heart hammering. The Gertrude tapes have been sitting in his desk drawer for days now, waiting to be listened to in a new light. He hasn’t told Gerry about them, and he certainly hasn’t told Martin. But he should. He _should_. If Gertrude suspected that an entity was at work—and it most certainly is, it has to be—than more heads are better than one. If Martin can work on the mystery from the past while Jon looks at it from the present—

Well. That’s what he should tell Martin. In some ways, that would have been easier. But there’s something else he needs to say. Something he’s never said aloud before.

“This…” he hesitates, his mouth dry. “This isn’t the first time something like this has happened to me, Martin.” 

_“What do you mean?”_ Martin’s response is immediate, without even the usual delay that comes with their unorthodox method of communication. There’s a high note of concern in his voice. 

“I...I suppose I should make a statement,” Jon says wryly. 

Martin huffs, but there’s something fond about it. Or at least Jon likes to think there is. _“Jon.”_

“It only feels right,” he says, still making a joke out of it. Or at least as much as he can manage. He shifts his weight and clears his throat. It’s almost embarrassing, doing a statement when he knows he has an audience. Or maybe it’s just the fact that it’s Martin. He tries not to think about whatever that’s supposed to mean. “Statement of Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist at the Magnus Institute, London, regarding a childhood encounter with the supernatural. Recorded July 8th, 2016. Statement begins.

“I was eight years old when my grandmother gave me the book…”

*

Very tentatively, Jon begins to hope.

Which is strange, frankly, given all the things he’s learning. Namely that the world is a very scary place, more so than he could have ever known.

And yet...he did, didn’t he? In a way. A lot of things are cast in a different light now—Mr. Spider and the stubborn gray streaks in Georgie’s hair that she pointedly doesn’t talk about and the way some statements make it feel like ants are crawling up his spine, like the very words on the page just _aren’t right._ Things that have always been there, only he didn’t have the tools he needed to look them head on. He’s beginning to understand.

And with understanding, comes power. He’s always thought that way, but it actually means something now. Before he was half-blind, trying to save Martin from his fate on little more than a wish and a prayer. Now, at least, he can see. 

It’s buoyed by that foolish hope that convinces him to go out for lunch. He’s earned it, hasn’t he? Nothing fancy, just a sandwich. Maybe from that new place down the street, where everything's just a little too expensive to be reasonable, even for London. As a treat. 

He should have known better. He really should have.

The blare of sirens makes him jump as he steps back out onto the street, brown paper bag in one hand and receipt in the other, but he doesn’t think much of it. The city is always undercut with the sound of sirens, though usually not so close. Distantly, he wonders what’s happened, thinks _oh, I hope everyone’s alright_ like he’s supposed to. But mostly he’s just thinking about his sandwich, and the backlog of statements waiting for his attention back at his desk. He grimaces to himself. He really has been neglecting his real job in the face of...everything. In part because he’s not too sure what his real job even means anymore.

And then he sees the crowd.

Jon squints, his feet faltering. He’s still halfway down the street, but he can see the Magnus Institute, and the mass of people standing outside of it, the crowd shifting uncertainly but not straying too far, despite the figures in shapeless gray suits trying to usher them backwards.

_Figures._ A part of him actually scoffs, suspended for a moment in a strange moment of disbelief. Very cute, Jon, feigning ignorance. As if the fire engine blocking half the street isn’t enough of a give away. That, and the smoke. 

The paper bag hits the ground and Jon starts to run. 

He loses speed when he hits the crowd surrounding the Institute, but he hardly notices. He just shoulders through them without sparing the time to look at their faces, his breath coming in sharp, panicked pants. The doors are thrown open so that the Institute can wheeze dark smoke, exhaling bouts of hot air that Jon can feel even from a distance. 

His lungs burn. He can’t breathe. He can’t—

_“Jon!”_ A hand catches on by the elbow and yanks him backwards. He stumbles and Sasha catches him, her fingers digging into his shoulders. Her eyes are wide. “Jon, you can’t go in there!”

“Martin—” He gasps, as if Martin is someone in the Archives. Sometimes he imagines him that way, when his eyes are closed and all there is is Martin’s voice in his ear, so real except for the gentle murmur of the tape spinning. Maybe he can’t be saved, maybe Jon’s a fool, but that becomes a certainty if the tapes are destroyed. Martin Blackwood will be well and truly gone.

He can’t lose him. Not now, not like this. He at least deserves to say goodbye.

“I have them!” Sasha shouts, yanking him back again before Jon even realizes he’s moving. Now he can see that her hair is stuck to her forehead with sweat, her shirt collar rumpled and smoke-stained. She’s breathing almost as heavily as he is. “I got the tapes! They’re safe! I knew—I knew they’re important to you.”

Jon falters, able to breathe again all at once. Martin is safe—or these leftover memories are, at least. It’s enough, that’s enough. It’ll have to be. He feels the relief in his chest like a physical thing, sharp and almost hysterical. 

He freezes. The tapes weren’t the only thing in his office. The Catalogue of the Trapped Dead is sitting in his locked desk drawer, just where he left it. 

And the Archives are burning. No one’s said where the smoke is coming from, but he knows. If he stopped to look, he might notice that no one else seems to feel the heat rippling in the air. 

“Jon! What are you doing? _Jon!”_

He tears out of Sasha’s grip and shoves through the crowd, ignoring the cries of protest that rise up around him. He stumbles through the invisible barrier that’s holding the crowd back, his feet catching against the pavement, but he hardly notices anything except the hammering of his own heart. A firefighter playing crowd control shouts and makes a grab for him, but only manages to brush his sleeve with his fingertips before Jon is out of range, running up the steps into the Institute. 

Heat buffets his hair and smoke stings his eyes, even before he’s made it to the top step. The Institute inside looks deceptively normal, except for the dark smoke staining the walls and the reflective strips off the firefighters’ coats flashing as they do their work. 

Gloved hands grab him around the waist and haul him backwards before he can take the last step. His heels bang painfully against the marble staircase, but he hardly feels it. He struggles against the grip, coughing as the smoke invades his lungs. Desperation makes him strong, but not strong enough. “Stop!” He tears at the hands, his fingernails snagging on the tough, fire-proof material. “Let me go! You don’t—you don’t _understand_ —” Eventually all he can do is cough, doubled over in the firefighter’s grip, tears streaming down his face as he’s pulled away from the Institute. But he stops fighting. 

He knows when it happens. He can feel it when Gerard Keay’s page burns, taking Jon’s hope up into the smoke with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> RIP gerry ): or... RIP 2. RIP for real this time. such a weird coincidence that the archives specifically caught fire. I will rest easy knowing that there was no foul play involved at all.
> 
> thank you for all comments and kudos!! <3 slowing down a little as I get busier with school and junk, but I appreciate all of them and I'm really looking forward to sharing the next chapter!! 
> 
> you can also find me on tumblr at [divineatrophy](https://divineatrophy.tumblr.com/), twitter at [blueskiddoodle](https://twitter.com/blueskiddoodle), or at the bottom of the ocean, sleeping peacefully.


End file.
